TaylorMade has created, a women’s set of 11 clubs designed to utilize technology in a way that delivers significant performance benefits to female players. From driver through to sand wedge, and including a Spider Mini Putter, the Kalea line is designed completely with the performance of the female player in mind. Gapping was also a key consideration in the lineup.

Tomo Bystedt, senior director of product design for TaylorMade, said the ability to gap the set properly is a key: “We wanted the set to have a seamless look-and-feel transition through all the different club types with gapping that was as consistent as possible,” he said. “This meant that, in some cases, we had to tweak traditional lofts and lengths to better match up with the target swing speed of the Kalea player.”

Key technologies:

Speed Pocket—A key element of a lot of TaylorMade’s clubs, Speed Pocket is incorporated into the Kalea irons to provide a higher launch and more forgiveness. The center of gravity on the irons is moved low and to the back, making them easy to hit, regardless of swing speed.

Ultralite graphite shafts:

A lighter shaft with a  softer flex allows female players to increase their clubhead speed.

Set configuration:

When TaylorMade studied the gapping in the set, they determined a traditional 14-club setup didn’t make sense. “We were able to eliminate long irons as well as the AW by adding an extra hybrid and weakening lofts slightly in the shorter irons,” says TaylorMade’s Bystedt. “Overall, the new KALEA set should provide excellent distance, ease of play and perfect gapping between each club in the bag.”

Aesthetics:

With a cart bag to complement the line, TaylorMade also created six headcovers that are available in three colourways. The roots of the club’s aesthetic originated in Hawaii: “We went back to the roots of where the concept started–in Hawaii–and came up with a modern take on a Hawaiian flower for the core of the design,” Bystedt said. “The flower concept allowed us to incorporate three new colors into each club in the bag and it also created the base for the three different bag designs available in the new Kalea set. Each bag and headcover colorway has its own character that allows the golfer to express their own unique personality and style preference.”

Spider Mini:

Engineered for the female golfer with a lighter head and 33-inch shaft, the Spider Mini offers forgiveness on strikes that don’t catch the center of the face. “As we all know, putting is a very important part of the game but is a product that is often overlooked in full set designs,” says Bystedt. “In the Spider platform we have a tour-proven technology that can greatly benefit golfers of all levels and we seized the opportunity to include it in the latest version of Kalea.”